The anime ended, credits barely rolling.
Countless homes echoed with chairs shoved back.
"Mom, I'm heading out!"
"Hey, Ken, you see that? To the arcade!"
"No dinner—I'm practicing specials!"
Quiet residential streets suddenly buzzed with teens, their target clear: the nearest arcade.
The cold night wind couldn't quell their fervor.
Sega's already packed arcades faced a second wave, dwarfing the daytime rush.
Pushing through doors, deafening noise hit like a wall.
The Fatal Fury machine area wasn't just crowded—it was impassable.
Newcomers, faces flushed from the anime, stared at screens, muttering.
"Down, forward, punch!"
"No, no—down, down-right, right, punch!"
A school-uniformed boy clumsily mimicked the TV's joystick arcs, fingers fumbling buttons.
Onscreen, Terry threw basic punches.
Mocking laughter erupted nearby.
"Haha, button masher!"
"It's ↓→, smooth it out!"
Suddenly, a nearby machine sparked a huge cheer.
"It worked! Burn Knuckle! I did it!"
A lucky player, after many tries, nailed Terry's signature special, red-faced and nearly jumping.
The crowd roared in awe.
"Whoa, so cool!"
"It's real—just like the TV!"
The success spurred others.
More tried their hand.
Spectators coached or jeered. Coins clinked endlessly. The game's intense fight sounds blended in.
The noise wove into a fevered crescendo, pushing arcades to unprecedented heights.
Lines grew longer than daytime, impatience brewing.
Some bickered over queue-jumping or machine-hogging, quickly separated by sharp-eyed owners.
Owners, pained yet thrilled, struggled to keep order while watching coin boxes fill at record speed, grinning ear to ear.
The anime's end "tutorial videos" acted as a precise catalyst, converting massive viewership into arcade coin drops and engagement.
Many players, using memorized inputs, quickly mastered basic specials.
The thrill of executing flashy moves surpassed anime-watching or random button-mashing.
The game's stickiness amplified infinitely.
"Terry's move is so good!"
"How do you do Andy's Zan-ei Ken? Next episode?"
"Joe's Hurricane Upper has crazy range!"
Talk of move execution, character strength, and practical moves dominated.
Some jotted joystick directions and buttons in notebooks, scared to forget.
Arcades steamed with heat, a stark contrast to the icy night outside.
The next morning, Sega's Third Development Department.
Group Leader Shimizu, sporting huge dark circles, buzzed with unnatural energy, like he'd downed three espressos.
His desk was buried in reports—snowflakes of feedback and preliminary revenue data from nationwide arcades, direct and partnered, from last night to dawn.
The fax machine groaned, spitting out new battle reports, each page reeking of ink and money.
"Ikebukuro's single-machine daily revenue topped 500,000 yen!"
"Shinjuku's Fatal Fury area had lines until 3 a.m.!"
"Osaka had players nearly fighting over machines!"
Each number and detail screamed last night's madness.
Shimizu, hands trembling slightly, held a report, voice hoarse with exhilaration. "Last night… my God… a nationwide storm!"
"All arcades' Fatal Fury revenue set single-day records—far exceeding! Some stores doubled!"
Yuji Suzuki, visiting from the second team to hear launch-day reports, nodded vigorously, eyeing Takuya Nakayama with utter admiration.
"Nakayama-san, this is genius! Tutorials in anime credits! Textbook cross-media synergy!"
"I snuck to my local arcade last night—man, the crowd was crazier than peak daytime! Kids fresh from the anime, beelining for Fatal Fury, coins flying. Anime viewers turned players, netted perfectly! Insane conversion rates!"
Takuya's lips curved faintly as he sipped steaming tea.
He'd anticipated last night's frenzy, unplugging his apartment's phone to sleep early.
The boiling scene matched his expectations.
"This is just step one," he said, setting down his cup, his calm voice anchoring the office's frenzied vibe.
"The anime's buzz is the fuse, tutorials the spark, igniting the market."
"But to keep the fire burning, we need more fuel."
"Roll out the planned promotional materials and events, step by step."
Meanwhile, Kyoto, Nintendo headquarters.
The atmosphere grew heavier than yesterday.
An urgent report on Fatal Fury's anime premiere and its end "gameplay tutorials" sparking a second arcade wave hit Hiroshi Yamauchi's desk like a military dispatch.
The report detailed packed arcades, estimated revenue spikes, and player behavior shifts.
It highlighted the tutorials' immediate impact: many non-gamers or casual anime viewers, guided by tutorials, flooded arcades, quickly learning basic specials, with coin-drop intent and playtime exploding.
Yamauchi gripped the report, fingers tapping the mahogany desk—tap, tap, tap—faster than usual, as if calculating or suppressing something.
His thick brows knit, eyes sharp as a hawk, dissecting every word.
The office was silent, executives breathing lightly, wary of disturbing the titan.
Their prior dismissal of Sega's "money-burning marketing" and "bubble" now seemed laughable.
This wasn't mere hype or a fleeting bubble.
Sega—or rather, Takuya Nakayama—had carved a new front with near-cheating precision, turning anime buzz into arcade revenue and player retention.
The effect's potency and novelty caught even Yamauchi, a veteran of industry storms, off guard.
For the first time, he took Sega's bold cross-media move seriously, with a trace of… unease.
"Monitor Sega's next steps closely," he said, eyes sweeping the executives, voice low but commanding.
"Especially the content in their weekly anime endings."
"Form a joint task force—marketing and tech development."
"Analyze this 'anime tutorial funnel'—its impact on player psychology, spending habits, and potential disruption to our promotional strategies and Famicom ecosystem."
"I want a detailed assessment."
Though he believed consoles were gaming's ultimate future, this suddenly "clever" rival was tougher—and slyer—than he'd thought.
An executive opened his mouth to ease the tension.
Yamauchi's icy glare silenced him. "Don't underestimate anyone who can pull money from players' pockets, especially in ways we haven't seen."
The executive shut his mouth, sweat beading on his forehead.